FAQ

We are at 1634 Eleventh Avenue on Capitol Hill, on the corner of Eleventh and East Olive.

Public transportation: Hugo House is a short walk from the Capitol Hill light rail station and the First Hill streetcar (Broadway & Pike-Pine stop), and within a half-mile of many buses, including routes 2, 8, 10, 11, 12, 43, 49, and 60. 

Parking: Multiple pay parking lots are available nearby. Street parking is also available but not guaranteed. The garage beneath Hugo House is for tenants only.

Our building is an accessible space and fully ADA-compliant. If you have access needs we can assist with, please contact us in advance and we will be happy to help.

Captions are available upon request for all our online classes.

Sign language interpretation is provided for our main stage Speaker Series events, Hugo Literary Series and Word Works. We are working to get make sign language interpretation available for more events in the future. If you would like sign language interpretation provided for a specific event, please contact our team.

Our aim is for Hugo House to be a barrier-free learning environment. If you have suggestions about how we can improve, we welcome your input.

Please see our COVID-19 Health Guidelines page for more details.

Sure. We’re always willing to answer questions about classes via email or over the phone. Just tell us a bit about your writing background (or tell us if you’re just getting started!) and about what kind of class experience you’d like, and we can assist you from there.

Contact us.

Classes in our course catalog are meant for adults unless otherwise marked or included on our Youth page. If you are a minor who would like to attend an adult class, please contact us to receive a waiver to be signed by your parent or guardian certifying that you understand adult content could be discussed in this class.

Each class description includes a breakdown of what you can expect in terms of in-class activity, feedback, and homework (if any). 

Generative means you’ll be generating new writing, either in class or at home between classes.

Workshop means you’ll be sharing work to be read and critiqued by your instructor and classmates and that you will also be critiquing the work of your peers. 

Reading means you’ll be doing close reading of a work with an eye toward craft. 

Craft discussion means you’ll be looking at the tools writers use to do that thing they do so well and then trying it out yourself.

Class levels are designed for various stages of the writing journey. Simply self-select the level that sounds best for where you’re at. 

Introductory: This is your first creative writing workshop, first writing class since high school, or first foray into a new genre or form. You’re looking to try something new, kickstart your writing, and/or establish yourself in the fundamentals.

Intermediate: You have a strong understanding of writing fundamentals and are eager to deep dive into craft. You’re honing your writerly identity and voice through independent projects. In workshop, you look for constructive feedback and are ready to do writing and reading outside of class.

Advanced: You’ve written a significant body of work and have taken it through several stages of revision. You’re getting ready to publish or are in the early stage of publishing, and you’re interested in refining the skills that will take you to the next level in the literary industry.

All Levels: You are any of the above and are looking to play with new possibilities.

You’ll get your class information, including Zoom link if applicable, three days before the first day of class.

We recommend an Introductory or All Levels generative class to kickstart your writing journey in a fun and low-commitment way.

We close online registrations on the day the class starts – contact us if you’d like to register. Sometimes a class is canceled due to low registration or at the instructor’s request. We recommend registering for your class more than five days before it starts to help prevent these cancellations.

Write With Hugo House is our free monthly write-in program, operated in partnership with the Seattle Public Library. Two take place onsite at SPL locations, one takes place online. 

Sliding-scale classes are offered every quarter. Find them in our Class Catalog.

We announce flash sales, early bird periods, and special deals through our e-newsletter; sign up at the bottom of this page.

At this time, we offer payment plans on classes 8 sessions and up. Email education@hugohouse.org with the name of the class you’re interested in to set up a payment plan.

• We charge a 5% nonrefundable administrative fee for all payment plans. 
• Extended payment plans up to 8 monthly installments and 16 semi-monthly installments are available upon request.
• We are unable to hold seats for prospective payment plan students. Students will be enrolled once their first installment has been paid. 
• If you need to cancel, Hugo House will issue refunds according to its cancellation and transfer policies. Your 5% nonrefundable admin fee will not be refunded. 
• If you withdraw from a class after it begins, you will not receive a refund and are still responsible for paying the full course tuition.

Asynchronous classes are perfect for students that need flexibility!

During an asynchronous class, instructors release new lessons once per week. Students then have one week to complete that lesson and any accompanying coursework. You’ll learn as much as you would in a traditional class but with the flexibility to work at the best times for your schedule!

While there are no live sessions, asynchronous classes are still a lively and rigorous experience. Async classes are not static lessons but an adaptable and energetic community space. Be ready to work in a collaborative environment, giving and receiving feedback on your writing, participating in discussions, and growing your writing practice in a way that works best for you.

Asynchronous classes take place through the website Wet Ink. Students receive an invitation to the class and to set up a Wet Ink account on the start date of the class. Each week of the class, a new lesson will be available through the Wet Ink portal. Classes close two weeks after the end date, and students receive an email containing their content from the class when it closes.

Besides a pen and paper, Hugo House itself doesn’t require anything. However, your teachers will email you ahead of time if they’d personally like you to bring in a work sample, laptop, etc.

If you are coming in person, we recommend all students check our current health and safety guidelines to stay up to date on any vaccination/negative test and mask requirements.

Tuition credit from cancelled registration expires after one year.

Most classes are offered at a general and member tuition rates based on instruction hours, with Hugo House members receiving a 10% discount on classes fewer than six sessions.

Early bird discounts are available during the first two weeks of registration and apply to both general and member tuition rates.

To help provide financial accessibility to our class offerings, some classes each quarter are offered with a sliding-scale tuition model, allowing students to pay what they can for the class. 

Hugo House will only process refund requests that are submitted 5 business days or more before the class start date. To request a refund, log in to your account, go to “My Account,” select the “Orders” tab on the left-hand side, click the appropriate order, and request a refund for your specific class. Administrative fees apply. Please see our full refund policy here.

In general, we do not record classes. However, an exception if a student has specific access needs.

We encourage students to only sign up for classes that fit with their schedule.   

We do not tolerate racist, sexist, homophobic, ableist, transphobic or any other oppressive behaviors, regardless of who commits them. Please check out our full community guidelines by clicking here. If an instance of community guidelines are violated and not resolved within the classroom, students may let us know by filling out the student incident report.

If Hugo House needs to cancel a class for any reason, you’ll receive a full refund.

You can apply for a scholarship by clicking the red “Request a Scholarship” text on class pages. The scholarship request text is located at the top of each class page, underneath the “add to cart” button.

Scholarship applicants must meet our income guidelines in order to apply for a partial scholarship. We do not ask for proof of income; however, we ask that all students be as truthful and accurate as possible when completing our scholarship form.  

At this time, we only offer need-based scholarships. Our scholarship program is intended to make classes financially accessible to students who may not otherwise be able to take classes with us. 

We do not award full scholarships at this time.

Most classes, including yearlongs and quarterly classes, are eligible for scholarships. Eligible classes will have the option to apply on the class page. Select classes, such as Workshop for Democracy, some visiting artist classes, and Book Lab classes are not eligible for scholarships at this time. We do not offer scholarships for events.

Due to the limited number of scholarships, please only request one scholarship for one class per quarter if you truly meet the financial need requirements.

You will receive an email about the status of your application approximately one to two weeks before the class begins.  

We consider multiple factors, including budget constraints, class demand, and student history at Hugo House. We are unable to approve scholarship requests from students who have already purchased a seat in the class for which they are applying.

Receiving a scholarship does not guarantee a spot in the class. Seats are filled on a first-come, first-served basis and remain open to the public until full. We encourage scholarship recipients to register promptly to secure their spot.

Unfortunately, we do not hold seats for students. Scholarship students are responsible for purchasing their own seat using scholarship monies before the class sells out. We release batches of scholarship acceptances at a time, and sell seats on a first-come, first-served basis.  

Each scholarship seat is offered for its specific class. Please be sure you want to take it before applying!

No. Scholarships cannot be applied retroactively on seats that have been previously purchased.

Yes. If you are a member, your scholarship will be applied to the member rate for the class (if applicable). Please consider this rate when you are calculating the amount of tuition you feel comfortable paying.  

Yes. Payment plans include a 5% administrative fee. If you plan to register using a payment plan, please take this fee into consideration when applying. For more information about payment plans, please see our payment plan policy.

At this time, we do not ask for proof of income.

Demographic data helps us better understand who is applying for scholarships. It also helps us secure grant funding for more scholarships! Demographic information does not influence decisions made about scholarship applications at this time.

We are currently not accepting new event proposals as we implement a new event system. We will update our website with new information about event hosting as soon as we are accepting proposals. Thank you for your patience!

Many of our events are free! Some events like Literary Series, Word Works, and a few other programs throughout the year include paid tickets that are posted on the individual events pages on our calendar.

Find events.

Hugo House does not offer refunds on ticketed events. If your ticket(s) are for an event in our Literary Series or our Word Works series, you may exchange your ticket(s) for another event in the same series and season. However, refunds will be given in the case of tickets to events that are cancelled or postponed by Hugo House.

If you would like to request a ticket exchange, please contact us.

Hugo House members get to register early for classes – a full week before they open to the general public!, receive a 10% discount on events and classes, and more. See the full list of membership benefits here!

Donations of all sizes allow us to provide access to quality writing classes, events, and experiences for all. Please consider making a donation to Hugo House today.

If you’re interested in contributing your skills, Hugo House accepts volunteer applications for a variety of roles, including event support, administrative tasks, and more. Learn more on our Volunteer page.

Learn about all the ways to support Hugo House here.

Thank you so much for your interest in sponsoring one of our events or programs! Please reach out to us at welcome@hugohouse.org. 

Writing groups are composed of fellow writers in a fairly serious relationship together—a relationship that is rarely formed via a blind date, and one that may be much more complex than any romantic relationship. We haven’t found a good way to facilitate these matches quite yet, but we’re working on it!

You’re looking for a small group of people who read your work in a critical, respectful way with exciting insight. You’ll typically find these people in a classroom. When someone understands or challenges your work in a constructive way, you won’t want to let go of them. And hopefully they’ll feel the same way about you. Keep in touch with these special writer friends, have coffee, take it slow.

We can’t, but our writers-in-residence are very helpful in advising writers on how to find an agent or send out manuscripts to various publishers. We also offer classes on publishing, book proposals, and finding an agent.

Definitely! We might even feature it. Let us know.